Mammalian cells containing a nucleic acid that encodes a recombinant protein are often used to produce therapeutically or commercially important proteins. Although several high throughput (HT) cell culture systems have been used within the biotechnology industry for fed-batch processes for years, no HT model for a perfusion-based cell culture using shake tubes and microcarriers is known to exist.
Previous methods of mammalian tissue culture using shake tubes for feed batch cultures or perfusion cultures can produce recombinant proteins at high cell density; however, previous methods of culturing cells using a shake tube and microcarriers have been unsuccessful because of the shear stress inflicted on the mammalian cells by the circulating microcarriers, which results in a decrease in cell growth. In addition, it is difficult to harvest a recombinantly produced protein from a shake tube culture containing microcarriers.